Monitor power saving - wear and tear concerns?

CX23882-19 · Post by **CX23882-19** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 3:24 am

Hi guys,
What are your thoughts on monitor power saving and how it relates to wear and tear on the monitor?

With hard drives I can see the point about not having them spinning up and down and loading/unloading the heads frequently but with monitors I'm not sure. For example, which out of these is better for the monitor (esp backlight)

Case 1 - monitor is:
On 2 hours
Total power on time = 120 minutes
Total Power on events = 1

Case 2 - monitor is:
On 5 minutes
Off 5 minutes
On 5 minutes
Off 15 minutes
On 45 minutes
Off 30 minutes
On 15 minutes
Total power on time = 70 minutes (58%)
Total power on events = 4 (400%)

In other words, what's more harmful to the monitor - the number of times that it's powered on and off, or just number of hours it's on?

Cheers

edh · Post by **edh** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 4:23 am

I suppose it does depend upon the kind of backlight. An LED backlight should be able to go on and off without trouble. A flourescent backlight might die at some point when being powered on.

Post by **CA_Steve** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 6:29 am

Gut feel is that LCD monitor failure due to energy savings mode on/off is a low probability. Weakest point is probably the FL tube...but has anyone had an LCD monitor die this way?

Wibla · Post by **Wibla** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 6:36 am

One of the backlight tubes on my LG L246WP is weaker at startup than thee others, so 1/3 of the monitor is noticeably darker during the first 10 minutes after being turned on... this after around 5000 hours of usage

edh · Post by **edh** » Sun Mar 15, 2009 12:07 pm

CA_Steve wrote:Weakest point is probably the FL tube...but has anyone had an LCD monitor die this way?

I've seen a ~10 year old touchscreen computer have this problem. Had to replace the inverter and tube. Just a light bit of soldering so is quite easy but you do have to watch for the high voltage contacts.